


you remind me of everyone

by SoloChaos



Category: Tiny Meat Gang (Band)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - High School, Explicit Language, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Pre-Slash, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-12
Updated: 2020-05-12
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:54:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24137677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoloChaos/pseuds/SoloChaos
Summary: For w0t_up_b0is' prompt:(High school au) Cody comes off as a average high school jerk, and Noel's just a dude who tries his best to ignore him; not because he's scared of him, not because he's worried he'll get laughed at, because he can't fucking stand people like him and wants nothing to do with him. One day Noel walks out to the back yard at a party and sees Cody crying in the cold.
Relationships: Cody Ko/Noel Miller
Comments: 10
Kudos: 97





	you remind me of everyone

**Author's Note:**

  * For [w0t_up_b0is](https://archiveofourown.org/users/w0t_up_b0is/gifts).



> Trigger warnings: explicit language, recreational drug use (alcohol and marijuana), references to sexual activity, graphic discussion of suicidal ideation, and some irreverence regarding said discussion. No one is actively suicidal in this-- it's more of a l'appel du vide thing, if you're familiar. But if you're sensitive to these issues, I would recommend sitting this fic out and maybe doing something nice for yourself instead.
> 
> Disclaimer: this is pure fiction, and I don't own anything except these run-on sentences.
> 
> Note: all opinions about Calgary (and its marijuana) expressed by Noel are not my own.
> 
> For w0t_up_b0is, who has gifted us with many lovely prompts and from whom I would like to see more!

Johnny Gardner’s party is Noel’s last-ditch attempt at finding something in his new high school’s social scene worth engaging in.

It’s a bust, as he expected.

It’s not as though he’s surprised or anything, but he’s still a little disappointed. It would’ve been nice to have at least little fun during his senior year. Why the hell his dad couldn’t wait one more year before uprooting them from LA to fucking _Calgary, Alberta_ is beyond him.

The party sucks, but Noel isn’t ready to go home yet. He’s standing in the corner, red solo cup in hand, watching the other kids talk about whatever high schoolers talk about in this boring, cold, dumb hick _motherfucking cold_ town when he remembers that he has a joint in his pocket. He tosses his cup and grabs his coat, pushing past idiots to make his way out into the backyard.

The Gardners’ backyard is weirdly small in proportion to their house. There’s a little porch for him to sit on, and with the one tiny porch light, Noel has a marvelous view of one whole foot in front of him.

He pulls the joint and his lighter out of his pocket. He takes his time lighting the joint; he hasn’t smoked up in weeks, and he isn’t going to fuck up the only joint he has on him by canoeing it. It’s well worth the effort; the cherry’s fucking gorgeous, and he’s lifting the joint up to his lips when he hears someone say,

“You mind sharing?”

Noel nearly inhales the joint itself. “Jesus Christ! What the fuck!” he yelps. He whips his head around, trying to find the source of the voice. All he sees is darkness.

“Sorry,” the voice says again, and Cody Kolodziejzyk shuffles into the light.

It’s not a surprise that Cody’s at this party; from what Noel has heard, the dude shows up wherever there’s booze. It’s a bit of a surprise, though, that Cody’s sitting out here, alone in the dark and… crying?

“Uh,” Noel says. It’s hard to tell in the low lighting, but Cody’s face looks kind of wet. “You good, dude?”

“Yeah,” Cody says, and now that Noel’s listening for it, he can hear a little bit of a wobble in his voice. “’m fine. You mind sharing?”

Noel looks at him for a moment. They aren’t friends. They don’t know each other. They’re in the same computer science class, but they’ve never even spoken before. Cody’s popular and gorgeous and Noel’s some weird skinny kid who transferred just for his senior year. There’s no way in hell Cody even knows his name. And now the fool wants his weed?

He means to say no, but he finds himself saying, “Yeah, sure,” for some reason instead. He hasn’t taken an actual hit yet, but he passes the joint to Cody anyway and watches as the other boy’s face in the dim glow of the cherry. The kid’s definitely been crying.

Cody takes two drags before passing the joint back. Noel takes it and doesn’t say anything about Cody’s shaky hands.

Noel had been hoping that they’d share the joint in silence— he’s fucking tired, they don’t know each other, and he can’t imagine that this kid has anything interesting to say. But because nothing can ever be easy for Noel, Cody starts talking after a few passes.

“I don’t know if you were up there, but you can go out Johnny’s bedroom window to hang out on the roof, and I was— I was up there earlier. Just, like, sitting. Like, on the edge. And I guess I drank too much or something, ’cause like. I couldn’t stop looking at the ground and imagining, like. I dunno. My skull cracked open. Guts splattered all over the place; that kinda shit. And it’s not— it’s not like I wanna die or anything, but I just— I couldn’t stop looking at the ground and _thinking_ about it, and then I started thinking, like. When was the last time I actually felt in control of my life? It just— I feel like I’ve just been following some path. I feel like I’ve never even made a, uh, a conscious decision in my life. It’s like I’ve spent my whole life asleep or something, and then I was looking at the ground and all I could see was this— this opportunity. Do something that just, like, doesn’t make sense for me to do. Because killing yourself is like. Fuckin’ absurd, y’know? And it’s not like I’ve never done dumb shit or whatever, but all the dumb shit I’ve done has, like, made sense. Like, it was dumb to get fuckin’ wasted the night before an exam, but it’s not, like, inexplicable or whatever. I was just a dumb fuckin’ idiot who wanted to get drunk and didn’t think about consequences. But like. Killing myself when I don’t even wanna die? That doesn’t make any fuckin’ sense, and I couldn’t stop thinking about doing it because the more I thought about it the more awake I felt. It was like I was in the driver’s seat for the first time in my life, and I just wanted to drive off a bridge before I get locked up in the trunk again.”

Okay. Noel’s too fucking high for this. “Man, what?”

“I dunno,” Cody says with a sigh, taking the joint from Noel. “It was fuckin’ freaky. Or whatever.”

Noel watches him as he takes way more than two puffs. It’s whatever though; Noel got way more during Cody’s fuckin’ soliloquy or whatever the hell that was.

“Why’d you tell me all that?” he says finally.

Cody shrugs, staring at his shoes as he passes the joint back over. “I dunno, man. You seem nice enough.”

Noel could be called a lot of things, both good and bad, but he doesn’t think “nice” is one of them. “Oh,” he says.

It’s a couple minutes or so before Cody speaks up again. “You’re Noel, right?” he asks. “Noel Miller?”

“Uh, yeah,” Noel says. He wouldn’t have guessed that anyone considered “popular” would know Noel’s name, but whatever. That’s hardly the weirdest thing to happen in the last ten minutes.

There’s a pause, and then Cody says, “I’m Cody. Uh, Kolodziejzyk. Cody Kolodziejzyk. We— we have comp sci together? Um. With— with Ms. Anderson at—”

“I know who you are,” Noel says, bemused.

“Oh,” Cody says.

The joint’s down to the filter, and they each have one more puff before Noel tosses it… somewhere. It’s too fucking dark to see where it lands, but hopefully it ends up in some bushes or something.

He leans back on his elbows and closes his eyes, listening to the shitty muffled music coming from inside the house, trying to enjoy his mediocre high while it lasts. If there’s a dealer in Calgary with non-shitty weed, Noel hasn’t found them yet.

His eyes snap back open when he feels a hand on his fly, trying to pull down his zipper.

“The fuck, man?” he says, batting Cody’s hands away from his crotch. “The hell you doing?”

“Was gonna suck your dick,” Cody mumbles, reaching out to try to pull Noel’s zipper down again.

That throws off Noel enough that it takes him a moment to find the wherewithal to smack Cody’s hand away. “What the fuck,” Noel says. “What… Why?”

Cody shrugs. “Dunno. Wanted to,” he says, tone almost petulant. “C’mon. Let me suck your dick.”

“…no,” Noel says, bewildered by this turn of events. Not only is he turning down an offer for a blowjob, but Cody fucking Kolodziejzyk is the one offering. What the fuck is going on.

“Why not?” Cody— there’s no other way to put this— whines. His hands twitch like he wants to reach out again, but he stops himself. “Just— just let me suck your dick, man. Don’t be a pussy.”

“Wow, baby, tell me more sweet nothings,” Noel says dryly.

Cody lets out a frustrated groan. “Just close your fucking eyes and pretend I’m a chick,” he snaps. “It’s not that hard, dude. C’mon.” He reaches out again, and Noel shoves his hands away.

“I don’t care about _that,”_ he says. “I just don’t want you to suck my dick right now, okay?”

There’s a long moment where nothing happens, and then Cody pulls his knees up to his chest and bursts into tears.

“Oh, shit,” Noel says, tensing up and looking around as if he’ll see something that’ll help. “I— uh… don’t— don’t cry.”

Cody just sobs, wrapping his arms around his legs and burying his face in his knees.

Jesus Christ, what the fuck is he supposed to do? In all honesty, Noel just wants to fucking leave, but something in him is insisting that he stay here with Cody. Especially after hearing that weird-ass monologue earlier.

“Fuck,” Noel mutters to himself before hesitantly reaching out and patting Cody’s back once, twice with the tips of his fingers. “It— um, it’s okay. I— I’m sure it would’ve been a good blowjob.” _Why the fuck did I just say that._

Cody lets out this strangled noise that Noel thinks might be a cross between a sob and a laugh.

“It— um, it’s not you,” Noel tries. “Well, no, it is you, because you talked about killing yourself for, like, five minutes straight and looked really sad, and that just made me, like, the opposite of horny. But, um, other than that, it. It wasn’t you.”

Cody sobs/laughs again, and Noel tries patting his back with his whole hand this time. He continues to babble nonsense because it seems to be calming Cody down. Just stupid shit, whatever pops into his head. He isn’t even entirely sure what comes out of his mouth, but hopefully Cody won’t remember it.

Cody’s sobs taper off after a while, thank god. Noel’s fucking done with this party. He feels weird about leaving Cody here though, even if he does seem to have calmed down, so he says, “Let me drive you home, dude.”

Cody sniffs, wiping his nose on his jacket sleeve. “You’re good to drive?” he asks, voice all wobbly and pitiful, and Noel snorts as he stands up.

“Yeah, man, I’m good to drive,” he says, offering a hand out to Cody. “Buzz wore off like, an hour ago, and y’all’s weed up here is weak as shit. I’m good to drive.” 

“Our weed is fine,” Cody mumbles, taking Noel’s proffered hand and heaving himself up. He nearly topples right back over— would have, if Noel hadn’t grabbed his arm— woozy from either alcohol, weed, or that fucking mental breakdown he just had. “Thanks,” he says as Noel steadies him.

He’s looking at Noel, eyes all intense, and Noel shrugs it off, opening the door and stepping back inside the house, holding the door open behind him.

The walk to Noel’s car is silent. Cody’s still a little wobbly, and Noel tries to ignore it before finally caving in and wrapping his arm around Cody’s shoulders to steady him, appeasing some weird, protective part of him that’s starting to grow. Hopefully he can sleep it off.

“Right now,” Cody says suddenly.

“Huh?” Noel says.

“Right now,” Cody repeats. “Earlier, you said— you said you didn’t want me to suck your dick _right now._ _”_

Noel focuses on scanning the dark street for his car. “So?”

“Are you, uh.” Cody huffs. “Fuck you. Are you saying there’ll be a time where you do want that?”

“Well, yeah,” Noel says. Cody’s got to know that he’s gorgeous. “Just don’t, like, monologue about killing yourself before it. That was some weird fuckin’ foreplay, bro.”

There’s a moment of silence, and Noel’s starting to worry that he went too far when Cody bursts out into loud, wheezy laughter, stumbling to a stop.

“I’ll keep that in mind, dude,” he gasps out through his laughter. He’s laughing a little too hard, maybe, like he’s a little hysterical, but Noel’s just happy that he didn’t just torpedo whatever was forming between them.

Maybe senior year won’t be so boring after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!! Kudos and comments are greatly appreciated. :)


End file.
